102.8

Sophie lost her second-ever tooth tonight. I remember so clearly the day she turned four months old and her first tooth came in. It’s sort of odd that her first teeth are now in my jewelry boxes, scattered among the earrings and pennies and safety pins. Nathan lost a tooth over the weekend, and so after the kids fell asleep, I folded two dollars into paper hearts and slipped them beneath their pillows.

Up till now, the tooth fairy has ALWAYS brought gold dollar coins, but despite writing myself a big, printed, circle-the-words "GET COINS AT BANK" note, I forgot to get coins at the bank tonight. These are cute, so I’m not sorry.

We’ve got this tenacious fever going around here. Sophie had it for six days, and Nate and Willow are in my bed now, tossing and talking in their sleep, sweet little furnaces. This is the first real string of sicknesses that we’ve had since I went back to work. A test, I suppose. I don’t want them to be miserable, so why am I disappointed that they don’t really need me so much?